“I don’t suppose the normal course of events would bring you here.”
“Correct. Did you know that Pete Adams worked for the Agency?”
He shook his head. “Not until the story was in the news.”
“Guess why I’m here.”
He sipped his Guinness. “I would really rather not. I have the horrible feeling I’d guess right.”
“I want access to your house to conduct a full investigation.”
“The police already did that.”
“You’re going to force me to say it, aren’t you? A paranormal investigation.”
“Scientific, no doubt.” He gestured towards the window. “You put those bastards up to this?” His blood pressure rose.
“They track me. That’s why they’re back in force now. But by the time I’m done, every last rumour of a ghost will have been boxed, labelled, and shipped off to Guantanamo Bay. We want the place’s reputation purged and boring. That should take the heat off you.”
He thought about this. “What would your investigation involve?”
“Three of us, plus equipment, living in the house until we’re done.”
“Which would be when?”
“I’m not running the science. If it were up to me, we’d be in and out in an afternoon.”
“I doubt that would satisfy the true believers.”
Meacham snorted. “Nothing would. But we still need a solid counter-story out there.”
“You do.”
Her smile was cynical enough to be honest. “This is a clean-up job. My agreement, though, with the scientist who’s going to debunk your house, is that we do this right.”
“I didn’t come out here to live in a circus,” Gray told her. Meacham was beginning to sound as if he’d already given her the green light, and he wanted her to back off.
“I realize and appreciate that. This is a difficult time for you.”
Gray knew a rote statement when he heard one. His hackles rose. “No, I don’t think you do realize. Not at all.” He held up a hand, warning Meacham not to interrupt and let the silence build to an uncomfortable length. Then he said, “I have no reason to allow either you or the crackpots into my home.”
“I might be able to compel you to cooperate,” Meacham said. Her tone was at odds with the words, as if she really did find what she was doing distasteful.
Gray didn’t have the sympathy to spare. “I’ll wait to hear from the Home Secretary. Meantime, leave me alone.”
Meacham hooked her thumb in the direction of the window. “You think they will?”
“You think a CIA investigation into the paranormal won’t draw them? And don’t tell me that they wouldn’t find out. You just laid out the exercise as a massive PR campaign. So I see no purpose in continuing this conversation until you have a police contingent to back you up.”
Meacham nodded. “I’m sorry you feel that way. I’d prefer it if we could work together.”
Gray raised his hands. “I’d prefer it if my wife and daughter hadn’t died.”
“Should you change your mind —”
“You’ll be at the Nelson, along with the rest of my personal care contingent.”
She placed a bill on the bar. “His drink is on me,” she told Porter. “I’ll see you later,” she said to Gray.
“I’d rather you didn’t.”
“You won’t have a choice.” She gave him a wink as she left. Gray wasn’t sure if that defused or backed up the threat.
He finished his drink and ate his lunch. He took his time, hoping the tab mob would move on. They were still outside when he’d finished. “I don’t suppose they’ve forgotten about your back door,” he said to Porter.
“Worth a look.” He was back a minute later, shaking his head. “Not many, but still enough bring the wrath of God down on you.” He started to laugh, thought better of it, went back to polishing a glass. “What were you planning to do today?” he asked Gray.
“I was hoping to pick up some groceries. Very subversive.”
“Give me your list.”
“Are you sure?”
“If my dear father could see me now, running errands for the aristocracy. He’d smack me upside the head, he would. He would be consumed with the righteous fury of a lifelong union man. Reason enough for me to make a stop at Tesco’s for you, yes it is.” His laugh was back in full force. “As for you,” he went on, “are you comfortable on that seat?”
Gray considered the long day of forced asylum that stretched ahead. “I might move to a booth.”
“When you’re ready to go home, say the word. Someone will run you back.”
“Thanks.” Gray ordered another pint, then stood up to head for a booth in the corner. It looked like private enough place to kill the afternoon.
“Want me to tell anyone you’re here?” Porter asked. He was serious, now, and sounding very significant.
Gray surrendered, as much because of Porter’s concern as his own guilt. “All right, Mother. You can call Patrick.”
Hudson showed up less than ten minutes later. He must have been camping out by his phone. He hesitated before sliding onto the bench opposite Gray. “May I join you?” he asked.
“Of course.” Have I been pushing him away that hard? Gray wondered. Yes, I have. Withdrawing the funding was a solid slap in the face, but he didn’t regret doing it. He was still drawing satisfaction from the act. He hoped Hudson understood the gesture wasn’t aimed at him. He gave his friend the first smile he’d granted him since the funeral. “It’s good to see you.”
“Really?”
“I haven’t been easy to know, recently. Sorry.” He saw hope spread over Hudson’s face, and he shook his head. “But no, I’m not going back on my decision.”
“It isn’t the money I’m most worried about.”
Here we go, Gray thought. How many times are we going to chase around this circle? “I appreciate that,” he said. He tried to steer the conversation into more neutral, less spiritual, waters. “I made the right decision to come down,” he said. “Had a very good night.” The morning had been weird, but never mind. He’d run from the Hall as fast as he could, but now he felt the need to get back. The pull was very strong. He was wanted at home.
“I’m glad.” Hudson sounded genuine. “I don’t mean to hound you, Richard.”
“Though you chased me here,” Gray bantered.
“Probably not the best way to bring back the lost sheep, is it?”
It was the first time they’d joked with each other since the explosion. Gray wanted to keep the tone light, but honesty won out. He didn’t want Hudson living on false hopes. “I wish you’d accept that this sheep is well and truly lost. That would make life easier for both of us.”
Hudson smiled. “I don’t give up easily. I promise not to piss you off, though. I will say this. You would find what you’re going through much easier if you would let go of your anger.”
“There you’re wrong. You’re really, really wrong.” He told Hudson about the paralyzing grief and the anger that had freed him. As he spoke, he saw his friend’s brow furrow with concern.
“That doesn’t sound good.”
“Why not?” Gray asked.
“Because anger doesn’t work that way. It imprisons. It doesn’t liberate.”
“Mine did.”
“That’s my point. Whatever it was you experienced, it wasn’t healthy. It definitely wasn’t normal.”
“You should talk to this idiot woman who thinks the place is haunted.” When he saw Hudson looking thoughtful, Gray added, “That was a joke.”
“I know.”
“You’re not taking it as one.”
Hudson didn’t reply for a moment. Then he asked, “Is that the only strange thing you’ve experienced at the Hall?”
Gray hesitated, and that was enough.
“There’s more, isn’t there?” Hudson went on. “You should be really careful.”
“I didn’t think ghosts fit in with
a properly understood Christianity.”
“I’m not saying there are ghosts in the Hall. I’m saying that it sounds to me like there is something wrong with the place. I don’t know what it is, only that it’s wrong.”
Gray buried his head in his hands. “Let me guess how the rest of this goes. You want to stay there with me and check this out.”
“Couldn’t hurt.”
“You’ll have to stand in line. Everybody but Greenpeace has been on my case to have access to the Hall.”
“You might want to consider at least some of these requests.”
“No. I want to be alone.”
“Go back to London, then. Open the Hall up, and when everything’s over, come back down. If the place turns out to be safe.”
The thought of the leaving the Hall was acute and painful. His heart pinched. He wanted to be there now. Run away to London? Unimaginable. The strength and irrationality of his need worried him. There was something wrong. But his need to be back at the house was stronger. “I’m not going anywhere,” he told Hudson.
“Will you at least think about letting me hang out a couple of days?”
“I’ll sleep on it.”
Most of the reporters were gone by late afternoon. There were other stories to chase, and deadlines to meet. Gray knew the reprieve would end the next morning, when he would begin his starring role in the papers. He could imagine the pictures and the accounts. He’d given them plenty to work with. He expected a wide-eyed, slavering gargoyle described as a selfish lunatic bought and paid for by the CIA. He tried to tell himself this would all be entertaining.
Porter drove him home and helped carry bags of groceries inside. The kitchen was the former butler’s pantry, off the courtyard on the north-east side of the ground floor. The colours were lighter here than in much of the Hall, the wood and paintwork a weathered blond. The room wasn’t big, but it was a perfect adaptation for a single person living in the Hall. It had been at least fifty years since there had been more than one permanent resident.
“Thanks,” Gray said as he and Porter unloaded the last of the bags. “Can I offer you a drink?”
Porter shuffled his feet. He looked antsy, a man wrestling with conflicting discomforts. “I really should be off. The pub can’t mind itself.”
“Your staff seems pretty competent.”
“That they are. They are. But no, must be going.”
Curious, Gray asked, “Does the house make you uncomfortable?”
Porter began to protest. “Oh, it isn’t that. I didn’t mean to suggest —”
“It’s all right,” Gray reassured him. “I’m not offended. I’m just interested. I’ve heard enough wild stories about the Hall today, never mind what happened to Pete Adams. Do you dislike the house, John?”
“No, not exactly. It’s just ...” He groped for the words. “The fact is, I would like to stay. I want to stay.”
“Then why don’t you?”
“Because I don’t know why I want to stay. I just do.” Porter looked at the floor. “Everyone in town does,” he muttered.
Gray almost missed the last sentence. He was trying to fend off the ice water that flooded his heart at the mention of irrational desire for the Hall. Run, said an instinct. Stay, said a stronger need. “I see,” he said, his voice as quiet as Porter’s.
The other man looked up. They locked gazes. “I think you do, at that,” Porter said. “You’ll be staying, then.” When Gray nodded, he held out his hand. “Be well, then.”
Gray shook. “Thank you,” he said, uncomfortable with the weight of meaning the exchange had taken on.
He saw Porter outside. The barkeep walked as though fighting against an undertow, as if each time he lifted a foot, he might start walking backwards. His brow was shining with effort by the time they reached the drive. He was unhappy to be leaving. And yet, when he started his car and drove off, Gray saw relief loosen his features.
Gray made himself an omelette for dinner. His evening was the same as the previous one, as if through repetition, he might make himself remember the experience, and not just the chronology, the next morning. He thought about moving to the master bedroom, but inertia called him back to his old room. He went to bed a little before midnight. This time he was able to change into pyjamas before he fell asleep.
He didn’t sleep through the night. He sat up with a shout in total darkness. His eyes were wide against the nothing that surrounded him. His heart was a deafening kettle drum. He didn’t know why he was awake. He couldn’t remember dreaming, but he felt the aftermath of a jolting night terror. He reached out, still panicky-blind, fumbled with the bedside table, the table that felt like an unpleasant surprise in its familiarity since it had come to visit him in London before he had come to see it. He found the light and turned it on. The room looked back at him, poker-faced.
His heart was slowing down, tempering its volume. He was very, very awake. He got out of the bed. He was prodded by the feeling of having left something undone. He couldn’t imagine what. He suspected the answer was nothing; he had forgotten nothing. He followed the discomfort out of the room, through the suite, back to the Old Chapel. He turned on the light and stood in the doorway. The nagging at the back of his mind had evaporated. See, he told himself, there’s nothing that needs doing now, for Christ’s sake. Go back to bed. He didn’t. He eyed the chapel. The stained glass window was painted black by the night. The space was illuminated by a low-wattage chandelier hanging from the middle of the ceiling. The light was a dim amber. Shadows were gathered spectators around the periphery.
Gray eyed the centre of the room. His lips were dry, and when he tried to lick them, so was his tongue. Go on, he told himself. Follow the scientific method. You know it’s all bullshit, so prove it. He walked forward. There was no mark on the floor where he had collapsed, but he knew the exact spot all the same, and he eyed it, rabbit to cobra, as he approached. Humbug and bullshit, he thought, humbug and bullshit, mantra of reason. He stopped when he was one step away. Humbug, he thought. Grow up and get over this. He took the step.
The grief slammed him to the floor again. It was so fierce it flooded out the terror that rose at its coming. Loss scourged him with barbed wire. He opened his mouth wide to howl his pain. Instead, he snarled. Lead grief transmuted into golden anger. The unfairness, the bloody-minded, capricious perversity of an all-loving god had him roaring and gave him strength. He didn’t crawl this time. He wouldn’t give the deity that satisfaction. He declared war and rose to his knees. Then he was on his feet, his hatred a molten, neon glow in his veins and behind his eyes. Crystalline revelation: revenge was the only worthwhile goal. He strode forward to begin his campaign. Within two steps, the emotions evaporated. For a moment he was a wrung sponge, exhausted. Then fear regained its usurped throne. Gray turned around to stare at where he’d fallen. He found he couldn’t swallow. He tried to rationalize, came up with nothing better than dead-of-night terrors and psychological predisposition. He didn’t buy it. He’d had confirmation of the tabs’ wettest dream. Meacham would be terribly disappointed if he let her team in.
A sliver of hope, just then: maybe not. Maybe her pet scientist could debunk what had just happened.
He backed out of the chapel and took the stairs to the ground floor. He would spend the rest of the night in the library, he decided. He would sit in full illumination, try to read, maybe try to sleep, and above all try to reconnect with the rational world. The staircase creaked under his feet. The noise was huge and alarming. Gray winced as if he would wake something up. Stop it, he told himself. Stop that now. He couldn’t allow himself to believe what he very much did. He began to grow angry again as the immediacy of terror receded. He was angry at himself. He expected better of his mind.
He reached the bottom of the stairs and stopped when he realized what room opened across a short hall from him. The crypt lay directly below the Old Chapel. He wished he didn’t see a connection. As punishment, he made himself approach the doo
rway. He turned on the hall lights and looked inside. There were no fixtures in the crypt, and the illumination spilled a pale glow into a third of its depth. It had remained unchanged since the fourteenth century. The stone-ribbed vault was low, and the space looked like a small, sullen church. It had never been one, to Gray’s knowledge. It was square, except for an odd recess in the southwest corner, invisible now without the daylight leaking in from the small window in the east wall. Nothing, Gray thought. The word was hollow, its meaning evacuated by the Old Chapel. Go inside, he said. Prove something.
He went inside, but only to cut across the width in the light from the hall. He stayed close to the wall, didn’t look into the crypt’s interior. He moved quickly, almost running, until he reached the other doorway. He wasn’t grabbed. His heart didn’t stop. He began to feel foolish and was relieved. You’re not off the hook yet, he scolded, and went to the kitchen, where he found a flashlight in a drawer next to the sink. He headed back to the crypt and shone the beam into its depths. The stone was impassive. He looked at the ceiling and visualized the layout of the chapel above. He thought the chapel’s danger zone coincided with the central keystone. One more experiment, he thought. He wondered why he was even contemplating this. He decided he could wait until morning, then realized that he was already walking forward. Hang on, he thought. He changed his mind. He told his feet to stop. They ignored him. He stood beneath the vault. The night made a fist and smashed his skull.
The dream came down on Roseminster. It took everyone. Citizen or visitor, investigator or media, they all went down. Anyone who had ever had a thought of Gethsemane Hall had the infection, and the symptoms clamped down hard. (In Washington, Jim Korda’s wife wondered why her husband was gasping dread in his sleep and why she couldn’t wake him up.) The dream had no images. It told no narrative. When at last they escaped it, the sufferers would not remember the dream, because there was nothing in it to remember. There was only the black, suffocating, strangling, immense and knowing. The dream said nothing, but it taught a lesson. It was the lesson whose pain and truth were so complete that it stabbed Roseminster awake. Every infected soul woke shrieking at the truth, unable ever to share the nightmare because of the lesson.
Gethsemane Hall Page 8
